MIAMI — The conjoined themes of the previous week were whether Mark Sanchez was adequately equipped to be the Jets’ quarterback beyond this three-year proving ground, and the consternation derived from coach Rex Ryan’s assertion that he won’t even consider anyone else.

“I told you guys, I think he’s the long-term solution — I don’t think there’s any doubt,” Ryan affirmed after his team’s third straight offensive fiasco.

“And he’s won a lot of games for us. We had three interceptions today — two of them by defensive linemen, I don’t think I’ve seen that before — and it’s hard to explain. But Mark has all the tools to be a great quarterback. He’s been a winning quarterback here.”
Only not lately.

Sanchez completed 21 of his 32 attempts for 207 yards and two scores. But the three interceptions (two to defensive end Randy Starks) were all amateurish throws, and he actually had a chance to put this game on ice in the very first period.

He led the Jets to a touchdown on their second possession — though the big play was actually a 41-yard pass from Jeremy Kerley to Dustin Keller out of the Wildcat — and his next two drives started at the Jets’ 44 and the 43.

Any kind of scores in those two possessions could have built a nice cushion, but the Jets went three-and-out both times.

The picks ruined his day, of course — “Today wasn’t his best outing, let me put it that way,” Ryan said — in each case, Sanchez looked like a quarterback struggling make multiple reads.

It was only three days earlier that Sanchez had asked his teammates to “trust me as your quarterback,” which tells you all you need to know about how he sensed the faith of his teammates is waning, if not exhausted entirely.

He has been a low-percentage passer in a high-percentage league. And if you are what your numbers say you are, he has become a bottom-five starter in that league.

“I’m confident we can win,” Sanchez said when asked if his confidence is something he needs to regain. “We scored down in the red zone most of the time during the season, and (we were) having our best red zone production as a team and personally.

“There’s a lot of good things from the season, it’s just the consistency part that’s got to get better, and we will.”

LaDainian Tomlinson gave the perfunctory testimony about how Sanchez’s teammates “want him to be successful,” but when asked to summarize the gains his quarterback had made this season, he arrived at this dubious conclusion:

“He has tried to make strides as far as knowing when to take chances and when not to take chances,” Tomlinson said.

Sanchez actually finished with 26 turnovers — among the worst numbers in the league — and he knows that doesn’t exactly inspire confidence.

“But I think that’s something you’ll have to ask those guys,” he said. “I think that if there was any lack of confidence there we might not have been able to drive the ball down the field (on the last possession of the game). Guys still want to play, and they know that I’ll keep fighting for them.”